Mr Crow's decision to take a holiday to Rio de Janeiro was said to make it very difficult for talks to take place between his union, the RMT, and the mayor of London, Boris Johnson, Mr McLoughlin said.

More travel misery is coming up for commuters, because of a continuing strike by London Underground workers even though fresh talks have been agreed.

Members of the RMT and TSSA unions will end their 48-hour walkout at 9pm tonight and officials will meet LU tomorrow to try to resolve a row over the closure of Tube ticket offices.

The unions have been urging London mayor Boris Johnson to meet them to discuss the closures, which will see the loss of 950 jobs. The mayor refused to meet the unions unless they called off the industrial action.

With another 48-hour strike looming next week, the conciliation service Acas said the parties had agreed to continue "exploratory talks" tomorrow.

But Mr McLoughlin said the decision by Mr Crow to go on a luxury holiday just before this week's strike took place made it very difficult for talks to take place earlier.

His comments came as Labour MP Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) said the Government should make Mr Johnson negotiate.

In a question to the minister, she said: "The spend on transport in London reflects the importance to London. Even as we speak, millions of Londoners are struggling to get to work because of this dispute.

"We know the majority of Londoners don't want every single ticket office closed down. What are you doing to make the mayor of London actually negotiate with the RMT?"

Mr McLoughlin replied: "I heard the leader of the RMT say last week that his holiday was planned 11 months ago - presumably he knew when he called the strike date he knew when his planned holiday was.

"I think the least he could have done was to abandon his holiday before strike action and been in this country ready to do it. I am waiting for you and Labour to condemn this outrageous strike action, which is doing nothing but causing misery to millions of people who work in London. You should condemn it, as I do."

Labour veteran Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) then added: "Isn't it a fact that it takes two sides to create industrial action?

"The problem with the Tory front bench is that they daren't attack Boris Johnson for not conducting talks because half the Tory MPs want Boris Johnson to be their next leader. That is the reason."

Mr McLoughlin replied: "You say it takes two to talk but if one of the main leaders is out of the country - Rio Bob, I think we should start to call him - then it is very difficult to have those conversations."